Mom Accompanies Fifth-Grade Daughter To School Every Day To Combat Bullies

Moms are great protectors of their kids — they don’t call us mama bears for nothing. And while we acknowledge and totally agree that no parent should sit silently by while their child is being bullied, accompanying your fifth-grader to school every day? Well, that seems like a little much.

As the Toronto Star reports, Jill Trahan-Hardy of Toronto, Canada, doesn’t agree, because she’s attending fifth grade with her 11-year-old daughter Harley Campos every single day, in order to keep her safe because she feels her school can’t.

Trahan-Hardy says officials at Earl Haig Public School were not doing enough to keep her daughter Harley from being harmed by bullies. According to Trahan-Hardy, Harley was threatened by two seventh grade bullies. When the mom brought up the incident to the school, providing an audio recording as proof, the bullies’ punishment of a day and a half of suspension was not enough to satisfy this mom.

Also not enough? The school’s suggestions of having Harley eat lunch alone or in an office, or having her transfer out of the school entirely. This was so unacceptable to Trahan-Hardy, she came up with her own solution. With the approval of the school superintendent, she has now become her daughter’s near-constant guardian: in the hall, at recess, and during lunch.

Extreme? Trahan Hardy thinks it’s necessary. As she told The Star, “It’s ridiculous that I have to do this. Hopefully this doesn’t have to go on for the rest of the school year, but if it does, I’ll be here.”

We can’t help but wonder how Harley feel about this. Is she becoming more of a target for bullies by having her mom shadow her every day? Eleven is a complicated age, it’s when kids are first trying to establish an identity separate from their parents, and having your mom around all day must really hinder this.

My kids are in fourth grade, and they won’t even let me walk them into the school, so I can’t imagine that Harley feels good about this. Or, maybe things at school were so scary for her, having an adult around is a relief?

Hopefully things work out so Harley can be safe at school without her mom’s supervision, before she unintentionally ends up making things worse for her. What do you think: Did this mom do the right thing?